Stockholm is beautiful, clean, friendly, and has much history. Our tour focused on the history of the area. We visited the Old Town area, which is from the Middle Ages. They have done a great job preserving this section and you can really get a feel for what living then was like. The streets are quite narrow. One passageway was just enough room to walk through.
Stockholm is another city made up of islands and bridges (can't remember the numbers). In one section is the sea and the other section of Stockholm is on a lake. There is a lock (sp?) separating the two. The water in the lake is quite a bit higher than the water in the sea.
Our tour then took us to Sigtuna, Sweden's first capital. Again, we were able to see some very old buildings. Sigtuna is now a small fishing village on a lake. We were there on Saturday; the locals seemed to really be enjoying the weather and the sun. We walked along the shore and saw many quaint cottages right on the lake's shore.
We then stopped for lunch at a local restaurant. We tried a local beer and had chicken covered in cheese.
Food in general here - they eat alot of Salmon and other smoked fish!!! I have grown a little tired of it. Actually most of our experience of local foods has been on the ship. We only had two meals on shore.
We noticed that there is alot more beer drinking. We especially noticed this in London. We were walking back to our hotel at the end of the work day. Pubs were overflowing with men in suits drinking glasses of beer. There is also alot more smoking. Even the kids commented on it and were counting the cigarrette butts on the streets of London. I guess that is one was to practice their counting!
The tour guide talked a little about the governing system in Sweden. While it would be hard for me to imagine, I can definitely see the benefits of their higher taxes. The unemployment rate is extremely high, and their economy is extremely good. There seems to be little poverty there. Education and health care are virtually free. One nice feature is that parents with newborns get 500 days of maternity leave (both parents) and are paid 80% of their salary.
Funny for the day: (I hope I am not repeating myself) The kids have been struggling with adjusting to the time change. They have been having a hard time going to sleep at night and then a hard time getting up in the morning (that alone is amusing to me cuz they are both early risers). A couple of days ago Kristina said "I don't have any big idea why Ben and I are so tired on this trip!"
Stockholm's biggest trade is wood. They have a wide variety of trees that are quite beautiful.
Another thing that I noticed in the countries that we visited is that boating seems to be big here. This seems a little odd since their summers are so shored (just about two months in the areas that we were). I guess one reason may be that it has been handed down through generations (maybe starting with the Vikings). That is just a guess. The other reason may be that they want to get maximum enjoyment out of their summers, since they are so brief.
Well, again there is more to come. I hope you are enjoying this. Let me know what you else I could share. I will dedicate another post to the landscaping and flowers.
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